Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

[Wanderer]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

I have no idea what you're talking about here. To me' date=' being able to see through walls is not trivial.[/quote']

 

I am referring to the fact that you can't infinitely divide the usefulness of any ability or Power of a character and expect to charge for each ever-smaller part of it. There needs to be a default package, a minimum amount of effectiveness that comes naturally with the power concept. You should not charge more for a super-sense ability to transcend barriers for the same reasons why you shouldn't charge more for Flight's ability to hover and be wingless, or Telepathy's to affect all humans instead of all of your close relatives.

 

Yes, you could do it with Limitations, but it seems easier to me to use Adders. A Detect can be as few as 3 points, in which case a Limitation isn't going to make much of a difference.

 

IMO, all the real problems you and others have with Enhanced Senses may be solved by defining two new Limitations: "Can't Perceive Through Barriers" (-1/2) and "Can't Perceive Through [Common Substance]" (-1/4). Apply them to Detects as needed for the pseudo-scientific SFX like X-Ray Vision or Biological Sonar/Radar, and all balance concerns are solved. Maybe they won't make too much of difference for the most trivial Detects, but for N-Ray Vision it will be significant.

 

And yes, super-senses need not have "normal obstacles," but IMO, they should have some obstacle that they can't penetrate. Different real-world senses have different obstacles too. Opacity determines what you can see through. Gas-permeability determines what you can smell through. Vibration dampening determines what you can hear through. etc.

 

That's because you assume that the default form of Super-Sense should be the biological/technological SFXs, which may indeed have such problems. IMO the default form in Superheroic games should be the psionic/mystical/cosmic/generic "super" SFXs, that have no such problems. Judging from comics source material, the "supernatural" or generic "super" Super-Senses which are not stopped by barriers are more relevant and widespread than "scientific" ones. Compare: Jedi's Force Awareness, Spider-Man's Danger Sense, super-mages' mystic senses, Marvel cosmics' Cosmic Awareness, vs. Superman's X-Ray Vision and Daredevil's biological sonar/radar. Just like default Flight in comics does not require wings, so default super-senses have no trouble with barriers. Those characters who do are entitled to a cp refund with LImitations, and so all balance problems are solved.

 

If they want the significant advantage of being able to perceive through barriers that others can't perceive through, then yes, they should pay more.

 

Just because you assume that should not come with the default package of a Super-Sense. I don't, just like default Flight should not be Levitation, or default Teleportation should not be to fixed locations only.

 

Then no one would buy N-Ray Perception, since it seems to be included in any other detect, for free. How would you build Superman-style X-Ray Vision, that is, Normal Sight with the ability to see through almost all solid objects.

 

N-Ray Perception isn't an Adder. It is a Super-Sense type, a SFX variant of Detect Physical Objects, linked to a Sense Group, and it ought to be a Limitation to balance the fact a common material can stop it. You should build Superman-style X-Ray Vision, as Detect Physical Objects, linked to Sight Sense Group, with the limitation "can't perceive through lead" (-1/4). This way, your balance concerns are solved.

 

Enforcing an extra charge just to make the default out of the relatively few super-sense SFXs that are limited by barriers seems to me a counterproductive way of doing things, when most SFXs for this power are not affected.

 

 

It'd be a bit more work, but it might be even better to rework the cost of Detects, which also seemed a little odd to me. The categories should be based on usefulness, rather than commonness/broadness of the category.

 

That would be another issue entirely.

 

 

Touched a nerve, did I?

 

Yes.

 

We can do without the personal characterizations.

 

Nothing personal intended. Just to explain how, as a player, I would find your house-rule annoying and excessive.

 

I could just as easily say you're the type who thinks when he buys a car, that he should get the gasoline for free. Or buying a one-way ticket and expecting the return ticket for free.

 

It's all about radically different concepts of fairness and expected minimum service/effectiveness for the default price.

 

 

"forcefully"?

 

Sorry. The nuances of English style escape me at times. Strongly/radically disagree.

 

How about Daredevil's "passive sonar"? He can "see" everything in the room he's in, including where the walls are, but he can't "see" through the walls.

 

That makes two. Most comic/movie characters with Super-Senses (Jedi, Cap.Marvel, Dr. Strange, Spider-Man) do not have trouble with barriers. Overcharging the average to set the threshold to the lowest common denominator is IMO bad system design.

 

 

It's the whole build of N-Ray that is wierd. For the "legacy homage," it should be as I described - an enhancement to otherwise normal vision, an Adder (or perhaps an Advantage). It's not just "Detecting Physical Objects" in the next room. It's *seeing* into the next room. What if there are no physical objects on the other side of the wall? Reading the way the power is built, N-Ray shouldn't be able to tell you that the next room is empty.

 

As it concerns the "legacy homage", I'll be the first to admit that the Pre-Crisis pseudo-scientific explanations simply do not look any convincing, and I'm rather enthusiastic about Byrne's Post-Crisis effort to make all of the Kryptonian power-set, psionic in nature, if dependent on stored solar enrgy for power, and therefore so-called X-Ray vision, just a form of clairvoyance. That's but one of the reasons I skirt using the N-Ray SFX power construct like the plague, and use variants of Cosmic/Magical/Psionic Spatial Awareness, whenever I feel a character concept may warrant that kind of Super-Sense. So I'm the worst person ever to ask justify the existence of a faulty, unplausible concept that has been discarded by the same context that borne it decades ago. Like so many cheesy Silver Age stuff, it should simply be dropped and forgotten, if you ask my opinion.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

Here's another thought.

 

Normal sight: what does it detect?

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

I am referring to the fact that you can't infinitely divide the usefulness of any ability or Power of a character and expect to charge for each ever-smaller part of it.

Again, using your own phrasing: I don't see the ability to perceive through barriers as infinitely small. I'm not "infinitely dividing" anything. I'm talking about one particular aspect of a sense that is not "small".

 

IMO, all the real problems you and others have with Enhanced Senses may be solved by defining two new Limitations: "Can't Perceive Through Barriers" (-1/2) and "Can't Perceive Through [Common Substance]" (-1/4). Apply them to Detects as needed for the pseudo-scientific SFX like X-Ray Vision or Biological Sonar/Radar, and all balance concerns are solved. Maybe they won't make too much of difference for the most trivial Detects, but for N-Ray Vision it will be significant.

Except that N-Ray vision won't exist because every other Detect includes it for free.

 

That's because you assume that the default form of Super-Sense should be the biological/technological SFXs, which may indeed have such problems. IMO the default form in Superheroic games should be the psionic/mystical/cosmic SFXs, that have no such problems. Judging from comics source material, the "supernatural" or generic "super" Super-Senses which are not stopped by barriers are more relevant and widepsread than "scientific" ones. Compare: Jedi's Force Awareness, Spider-Man's Danger Sense, supoer-mages' mystic senses, Marvel cosmic characters' Cosmic Awareness, vs. Superman's X-Ray Vision and Daredevil's biological sonar/radar.

Maybe we're just reading different source material. I am not making any assumption about SFX. I notice two of your own examples *are* blocked by barriers. As are most depictions of mental/psychic senses IMX (hence the aluminum foil helmets to keep "them" from reading your thoughts, etc.), and most magic-based sensing has magic-based barriers to sensing as well. To be clear, I'm not saying that every Detect should have the same barrier as normal sight, or that if they have less common barriers, that it should always be lead or other dense metals.

 

N-Ray Perception isn't an Adder. It is a Super-Sense type, a SFX variant of Detect Physical Objects, linked to a Sense Group, and it ought to be a LImitation to balance the fact a common material can stop it. You should build Superman-style X-Ray Vision, as Detect Physical Objects, linked to Sight Sense Group, with the limitation "can't perceive through lead" (-1/4). This way, your balance concerns are solved.

Well sort of, but it makes N-Ray a useless thing that no one would ever buy, since they always get it for free with every other Detect. Since characters are assumed to already have normal sight, it's a bit kludgy to make them buy sight again, just so they can put a -1/4 "not through lead" limitation on it.

 

Putting a limitation on the relatively few super-sense SFXs that are limited in effect seems to me a counterproductive way of doing things, when most SFXs for this power are not effected.

I guess we just disagree about how common it is for super senses to be blockable. And remember, HERO isn't just comic-book superheroes.

 

Overcharging the default to set the threshold to the lower common denominator is IMO bad system design.

The default is the normal senses that people have, not the super senses. You build additional abilities by buying the aspects that you don't already have. I'd call that good system design.

 

Spatial Awareness, with the "can't see through lead" Limitation, linked to the Sight Sense Group, builds N-Ray Vision adequately. Putting a Super-Sense in a normal Sense Group sets the "seeing" issue. There is no need for giving Adders or Advantages to the normal sight group. What do you find so unsatisfactory with enhancing a normal sense group by adding a sense power to it?

You're essentially making him buy his normal sight again, this time with the not through lead limitation. He can already detect physical objects. The only thing being added is to bypass certain barriers. It's not a whole new sense, it's an enhancement to the existing sense.

 

You say there's no need for the Adders or Advantages, but there is a need for *something*. Either an Adder or Advantage to be able to see through barriers, or a Limitation to not have that ability, as you suggested. I happen to prefer the Adder solution to the Limitation solution. Perhaps the simplest reason is, that if you want your vision (a sense you already have) to see through walls, you have to add something to it. Since it doesn't start with the ability to see through walls, there's no Limitation to put on it, or to "buy off".

[Wanderer]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

Except that N-Ray vision won't exist because every other Detect includes it for free.

 

As for my own opinion about N-Ray Vision, it's a faulty, unplausible homage to a bit of Silver Age cheesy explanation for a Superman power that has been discarded by the same context that borne it decades ago. I'm rather enthusiastic about Byrne's Post-Crisis effort to make all of the Kryptonian power-set, psionic in nature, if dependent on stored solar energy for power, and therefore so-called X-Ray vision, just a form of clairvoyance. I'm the worst person ever to ask justify the existence of a faulty, unplausible concept that IMO like so much cheesy Silver Age stuff, should simply be dropped and forgotten, if you ask my opinion.

 

We don't need N-Ray as a power construct. Sight, like Hearing, is a concept that is firmly grounded in scientific realism, and involves perceiving a form of energy emission. That SFX imples being stopped by the appropriate barriers. "I can see X-Rays" will never work as a plausible explanation since there aren't enough radiation of that kind to allow that kind of illumination, and if it were, we would be all dead. If we need to make Sight able to sense through barriers, we need to invoke a different kind of sense, that transcends physical laws (magic, psionics, cosmic, reality warping...) and state that the owner's body/mind, for whatever reason, channels it through the eyes. In Hero terms, pick Spatial Awareness, and put it in the Sight Group.

 

 

I notice two of your own examples *are* blocked by barriers.

 

None of my examples are stopped by ordinary barriers. Super-science or magical countermeasures to super-senses aren't such, they are powers in their own right.

 

As are most depictions of mental/psychic senses IMX (hence the aluminum foil helmets to keep "them" from reading your thoughts, etc.),

 

I thought we were assuming source material that takes itself seriously, not the popular culture jokes that are used to make fun of the delusions of conspiracy theorists, and their reflections in comedy. Typically, suppressing psionic powers in non-farcical source material takes super-science. Or if it doesn't, it's an inborn flaw (a Limitation) of that power.

 

and most magic-based sensing has magic-based barriers to sensing as well.

 

Those are sense-suppressing powers, not ordinry stuff. Pretty much any Super-Sense SFX can be suppressed or negated if you use the appropriate power and SFX. It's like Goblin using super-science drugs to negate Spider-Man's Danger Sense. For the scope of our discussion, it's irrelevant.

 

 

Well sort of, but it makes N-Ray a useless thing that no one would ever buy, since they always get it for free with every other Detect.

 

Not just any Detect. Just the ones that are sufficiently broad in object as to be able to function as a substitute of Sight (at least in circumstances that are relevant to heroic activities). Again, what is so precious in N-Ray as a separate power construct SFX to preserve, "my vision/hearing/smell is able to cross physical barriers that stop the stuff my sense perceives" ? It's a SFX that is extremely difficult to justify and make plausible, in the lack of outright reality-warping rewriting physical laws on the fly (in such a case, it's "stopped by lead" that becomes rather difficult to justify). Modern comics and sci-fi do not use it. Not even the character that originated it has been using it for the last two decades. The Silver-Age pseudoscience that birthed it is dead and buried. It own name comes from a scientific fraud. Hero does not really need it.

 

I guess we just disagree about how common it is for super senses to be blockable. And remember, HERO isn't just comic-book superheroes.

 

Blockable from ordinary stuff, as opposed to super-countermeasures, that is. But it's plain we disagree in our perceptions of the source material, either comic-book superhumans, or all the other genres (e.g. high-fantasy magic, space-opera psionics) where super-senses are plausible. IMO, your concerns are only really justified in hard SF where the only super-senses available are biological genegineered or cybernetic bionic augmentations. But in such a scenario, N-Ray as in "my vision/hearing/smell is able to cross physical barriers that stop the stuff my sense perceives" cannot exist.

 

The default is the normal senses that people have, not the super senses. You build additional abilities by buying the aspects that you don't already have.

 

Not by violating the same principles by which the ability you are expanding is functioning. Otherwise, what you have to buy is a wholly new system, that at most is re-wired to offer output through the same channels as the old one.

 

You're essentially making him buy his normal sight again, this time with the not through lead limitation. He can already detect physical objects. The only thing being added is to bypass certain barriers. It's not a whole new sense, it's an enhancement to the existing sense.

 

Normal Sight, by its nature, is detect electromagnetic energy of a specific frequency interval. Barriers that stop it, stop the sense. You can't make that SFX overcome the limitation, by its very nature. What you are trying to perceive doesn't exist anymore. What you end up doing, is either rewiring a different sense through the eyes, or rewriting reality so that the physical laws that regulate light, are not valid anymore for your eyes. Which in the end, is functionally indistinguishable anyway from a new sense.

 

Perhaps the simplest reason is, that if you want your vision (a sense you already have) to see through walls, you have to add something to it.

 

Yes, the SFX that allows you to violate the physical law limitations of the propagation of light. Which is either a new sense that you get as sight, or reality-warping to make the photons being "resurrected" the other side of the wall, or coming to you through a spatial distortion, or whatever. Anyway, something new that is plugged to sight, not "sight-plus". Which fits perfectly with "new sense, plugged to sight group" philosophy.

[Wanderer]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

Here's another thought.

 

Normal sight: what does it detect?

 

Detect electromagnetic emissions in the frequency interval of visible light. Which is what makes "I see through walls" as a SFX extremely difficult to justify (without reality-warping, that is). The wall stops the light, so past it, there is nothing to perceive. "I see X-Rays" cannot ever work, since it becomes laughable the moment one applies a bit of scientific common sense (necessary, since you invoke a hard-science concept, "X-Rays").

[Sean Waters]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

Detect electromagnetic emissions in the frequency interval of visible light. Which is what makes "I see through walls" as a SFX extremely difficult to justify (without reality-warping' date=' that is). The wall stops the light, so past it, there is nothing to perceive. "I see X-Rays" cannot ever work, since it becomes laughable the moment one applies a bit of scientific common sense (necessary, since you invoke a hard-science concept, "X-Rays").[/quote']

 

Is that not the point though: well, two points:

 

1. It is detect EMR between 400 and 700 nm wavelength, a 10 point detect, I assume. You could buy the detect as EMR between 10nm and 1mm, and be able to see between the far UV and the far IR - it is entirely arbitrary, and a simple change in the definition of what is detected substantially changes the utility. In most games that would not be a problem, because you can't infinitey customise the characters, but in Hero, where you can, and in which, moreover, a point system for controlling balance exists, it is an important point. If I buy 'detect EMR' how much should that be costing me: I can then detect the whole spectrum?

 

2. As you say you shouldn't be able to see much with X-Ray vision: anything that can basicaly ignore barriers should not be able to detect them. You seem to be arguing that being able to see through walls should be the default position, but is not really justifyable. Well, it COULD be: you just see in a much wider spectrum...so you can see the walls and what is on this side AND the other side. Mind you, that should have a different cost, in a system that uses points to balance utility, that only being able to detect wheree the walls are and what is on this side of htem.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

As for my own opinion about N-Ray Vision, it's a faulty, unplausible homage to a bit of Silver Age cheesy explanation for a Superman power that has been discarded by the same context that borne it decades ago. I'm rather enthusiastic about Byrne's Post-Crisis effort to make all of the Kryptonian power-set, psionic in nature, if dependent on stored solar energy for power, and therefore so-called X-Ray vision, just a form of clairvoyance. I'm the worst person ever to ask justify the existence of a faulty, unplausible concept that IMO like so much cheesy Silver Age stuff, should simply be dropped and forgotten, if you ask my opinion.

 

We don't need N-Ray as a power construct. Sight, like Hearing, is a concept that is firmly grounded in scientific realism, and involves perceiving a form of energy emission. That SFX imples being stopped by the appropriate barriers. "I can see X-Rays" will never work as a plausible explanation since there aren't enough radiation of that kind to allow that kind of illumination, and if it were, we would be all dead. If we need to make Sight able to sense through barriers, we need to invoke a different kind of sense, that transcends physical laws (magic, psionics, cosmic, reality warping...) and state that the owner's body/mind, for whatever reason, channels it through the eyes. In Hero terms, pick Spatial Awareness, and put it in the Sight Group.

 

Regardless of how you set the SFX, Superman's (and Hitman's - he has no other sensory powers) X-Ray vision permits him all the same benefits as normal sight, plus the ability to see through barriers. This indicates there is a need for an ability that allows one to see through barriers without having an extra sense over and above the sight group.

 

Not just any Detect. Just the ones that are sufficiently broad in object as to be able to function as a substitute of Sight (at least in circumstances that are relevant to heroic activities).

 

That sounds a lot more like Targeting - which is effective in its own right whether or not it permits perception through a barrier - not N Ray.

 

Not even the character that originated it has been using it for the last two decades. The Silver-Age pseudoscience that birthed it is dead and buried. It own name comes from a scientific fraud. Hero does not really need it.

 

Actually, Superman still sees through walls and his perception is stopped by lead. Hitman enjoyed a recent story, and still had that ability as well. You seem to be hung up over the name "N-Ray". Would you be happier if the ability to perceive through barriers were renamed "indirect", "penetrating", "unblockable" or some other term that does not imply some form of radiation? This is no different from believing an Energy Blast cannot be physical due to the name.

 

Moving to other genres, it's common for detection type spells to be blocked by barriers as well. A bit of metal, a thickness of stone or wood. Perhaps not the same precise things that block normal sight, but certainly typical barriers. Shouldn't the toolkit be able to simulate this? To me, the adder, which can make senses already possessed by default, or senses designed from scratch, more effective seems the most logical approach to me.

[SteveZilla]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

Is there a commonly accepted writeup for The Sight Sense Group, and for Normal Sight? It'd be good to have the "baseline" defined first before deciding a lot of other things that derive from it, IMO.

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

As for my own opinion about N-Ray Vision, it's a faulty, unplausible homage to a bit of Silver Age cheesy explanation for a Superman power that has been discarded by the same context that borne it decades ago. ....

We don't need N-Ray as a power construct. .... In Hero terms, pick Spatial Awareness, and put it in the Sight Group.

Now you're the one "increasing the CP bill". Making characters pay for a whole new sense (22 points) instead of an extention/expansion of their existing sense (10 points).

 

None of my examples are stopped by ordinary barriers. Super-science or magical countermeasures to super-senses aren't such, they are powers in their own right.

Actually, Daredevil's sonar is stopped by "ordinary barriers" as I've said several times now, but you keep ignoring. In any event, I didn't say "ordinary". And lead is not a "power in its own right."

 

I thought we were assuming source material that takes itself seriously, not the popular culture jokes that are used to make fun of the delusions of conspiracy theorists, and their reflections in comedy. Typically, suppressing psionic powers in non-farcical source material takes super-science. Or if it doesn't, it's an inborn flaw (a Limitation) of that power.

Again, don't assume that the source material you've read is all there is. I've seen *lots* of source material that does exactly as I've described. And it takes itself seriously. (A bit like Magneto's helmet.) Metal is a very common blocker for "extra" senses in many genres. As are other mundane subtances.

 

Not just any Detect. Just the ones that are sufficiently broad in object as to be able to function as a substitute of Sight (at least in circumstances that are relevant to heroic activities).

I'm not sure what you mean here. By the book, N-Ray can be defined in any sense group, not just sight. All normal senses have barriers (as I said before).

 

Again, what is so precious in N-Ray as a separate power construct SFX to preserve, "my vision/hearing/smell is able to cross physical barriers that stop the stuff my sense perceives" ? It's a SFX that is extremely difficult to justify and make plausible, in the lack of outright reality-warping rewriting physical laws on the fly (in such a case, it's "stopped by lead" that becomes rather difficult to justify). Modern comics and sci-fi do not use it. Not even the character that originated it has been using it for the last two decades. The Silver-Age pseudoscience that birthed it is dead and buried. It own name comes from a scientific fraud. Hero does not really need it.

What?! Just about every power we have *especially* in the superhero genre is an "SFX that is extremely difficult to justify and make plausible." Why is perceiving through barriers so special that it shouldn't exist in the game? Please don't argue from your perceived "lack of existence" in the source material. It exists even in "modern comics and sci-fi." One of the basic ideas in HERO is that you ought to be able to build anything you can think of. Regardless of how silly you personally may think silver-age Supes' X-Ray vision is, it is one of many things we can think of, and IMO, far from the silliest.

 

Not by violating the same principles by which the ability you are expanding is functioning. Otherwise, what you have to buy is a wholly new system, that at most is re-wired to offer output through the same channels as the old one.

And another principle of HERO is that you pay points for actual utility of powers, not for their (pseudo-)scientific explanation. The cost of perceiving (with an already-existing, otherwise normal sense) through barriers, is based solely on how useful that is, not on its SFX or its plausibility. +3" of Running costs more than Immortality, because in the play of the game, +3" of Running is more useful than Immortality.

[SteveZilla]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

This discussion IMO asks (indirectly) a few questions:

 

1. Should a sense that can penetrate a normally opaque object* by default be able to perceive the entirety of the inside of that object?

 

*"normally opaque" is relative to the closest sense "match" (like X-Ray Vision and Normal Sight).

 

For example: ReallyAmazingMan has "Super-Vision" that lets him see though walls.

 

2. Can he see the pipes, wires, and studs *inside* the walls?

 

3. If his "Super-Vision" is an extension of his Normal Sight and not a sense unto itself, can he do item #2 without a light source inside the wall? Or in the dark next room past the wall?

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Quick confusion on Unusual Senses

 

This discussion IMO asks (indirectly) a few questions:

 

1. Should a sense that can penetrate a normally opaque object* by default be able to perceive the entirety of the inside of that object?

 

*"normally opaque" is relative to the closest sense "match" (like X-Ray Vision and Normal Sight).

 

For example: ReallyAmazingMan has "Super-Vision" that lets him see though walls.

 

2. Can he see the pipes, wires, and studs *inside* the walls?

 

3. If his "Super-Vision" is an extension of his Normal Sight and not a sense unto itself, can he do item #2 without a light source inside the wall? Or in the dark next room past the wall?

These are fine questions which, IMO, should have been taken into consideration when the 5th Ed version of Senses (N-Ray in particular) was being designed.